


Losing Touch

by cuddlesome



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Blood, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Head Injury, Nightmares, Snow, but then isn't all the best reylo like that?, kind of romantic in a messed up way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-16
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-08-09 02:58:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7784062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlesome/pseuds/cuddlesome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey fights with her nightmarish conception of Kylo Ren only to be saved by the reality.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Losing Touch

In Luke Skywalker’s hut, Rey sleeps, safe from the downpour that had started that night. The danger of being swept away by water from the sky was at once terrifying and transfixing. Either way, she had the sense to accept shelter from the Jedi.

In her dreams, Rey is not nearly as safe. She is still on Ahch-To, but Luke is gone and the rain has crystalized. She wrestles with darkness incarnate in heaps of snow. The outfit made for her by the Resistance is only minimally better at protecting her from the wet cold than her old rags—her bared skin stings and the cloth soaks it up—but fury makes her blood boil and keeps her warm.

She tries to hurt Kylo Ren for hurting her. For hurting her friends. For hurting so many others.

Unlike on Starkiller, he refuses to stay down. He rolls with every blow she lands on him with feet and fists, then comes back twice as strong. Digging her fingernails into the slit opening where his eyes should be once she breaks open his visor similarly does nothing. Her fingers meet no resistance. He does not have eyes, skin, flesh, or bone. There is nothing but darkness behind the mask.

In her moment of transfixed horror after she yanks her hand back, he seizes the opportunity to pin her beneath his huge body. Rey’s breaths come out in clouds of vapor until he smothers her with himself. Metal grinds against her mouth in a sick parody of a kiss. The mouthpiece of the helmet is freezing cold. The delicate skin on Rey’s lips catches and little pieces are torn off.

He pulls his head back, then reaches toward her face and Rey flinches away. With a growl he forces her head to still, turning it to the side and shoving half of it into the snow. The knots in Rey’s hair are pulled out and he yanks on her hair to face him again with one hand. Invisible fingers, tendrils of the Force, are not his tools of torture. No, he uses his other hand in a much more direct way, wrapping it around her face until she cannot see and just barely breathe. Just when she has convinced herself she can tolerate the suffocating meat of his palm against her nose and mouth paired with the stink of leather, it gets worse. He slams her head into the packed ice. Once, twice, three times, then more, increasing in speed each time. The world goes dark, then spins back into focus dotted with stars among the snowflakes.

At some point she should probably be dead, but the fantastical nature of the dream keeps her conscious enough to experience every bit of pain. She is barely aware enough to realize when the beating stops and she hears a familiar hum over the storm along with quick steps.

She dares to hope that it’s Luke Skywalker come to help her. She even goes so far as to purposefully ignore the off-kilter sputter to the hum in order to fuel that hope. The lambent light of a lightsaber appears in the corner of her spotty vision and the hope is put out so thoroughly it might not have existed at all.

The lightsaber casts a red haze over the snow and its owner. Another Kylo Ren runs toward them, unmasked and teeth bared. Rey wants to scream. The masked one on top of her eases off of her and turns to face him just in time to have its head run through with the saber. A strange, mechanical whine can be heard, then a pile of ash is all that is left of it. The snow and wind erases even that much.

This new Kylo Ren, who is surely another conjuration of her mind, does not have a top on. His still-healing wounds from Starkiller are in plain view, the inflamed rips dark against his wan skin. He has a body bespeaking of being fed enough to build up some weighty muscle but not enough to cure him of hunger completely.

His lightsaber spits embers at her, its ragged outline like teeth shining in firelight. He looks angry--of course he does--but there's also an undeniable sadness in his trembling lips.

"This is what you think of me?" He stabs his lightsaber toward where the creature had been.

Rey does not dignify his question with a response as she attempts to edge to her feet. The slushy snow is speckled with blood. Her vision rocks back and forth. She must get away. This time she is the one injured and, worse yet, unarmed. The moment she thinks of her lack of a weapon, Kylo deactivates his lightsaber-- _sssshhhk_. As Rey gets to her feet, she slips on the bloodied slush, only to be caught in his arms. She may as well be a runty loth-cat for how easily he picks her up.

Cradled in his hold, Rey realizes the smell of ashes and death that cling to him are offset by the sweet sting of ozone; flowers at a funeral.

"Despite what you may think, I am no monster. I would never hurt you like this.”

Some tiny shred of her believes him, but it is quickly squelched by the weight of the pain in her head.

Bracing her against his chest, he reaches up with one hand to pet her wet, bloodied hair, then massages her temple with his fingers. Rey does not have the strength to push away the gesture that was at once comforting and patronizing, but in a moment she realizes she does not want to.

Unlike the digging, ripping pain of his former mind invasion or the steady beating she had conjured, his touch is gentle and… she cannot manage to use “kind” to describe any aspect of him. She squeezes her eyes shut.

There is a trickle of the Force at work and there is no darkness in it. If she keeps her eyes closed, she can at least pretend that the hand on her head is weathered and old instead of the hand of a murderous beast still wet with his father’s blood.

Right in sync with her thoughts, his hand stills, then trembles a bit. The warm, honeyed stream of the Force flowing through Rey’s aching head rots and twists. It feels much more like him.

Before Kylo Ren can do anything else--presumably release his anger onto her and finish the others’ job--Rey feels another hand on her shoulder. A disembodied third hand that is the savior she had been wishing for.

Rey opens her eyes. It is not to the face of Kylo Ren, thankfully for her sanity. Luke Skywalker leans over her with a concerned expression, his flesh hand on her shoulder. She does not tell him why she had been thrashing in her sleep and he does not prod.

There are other nights where she dreams of her rival, but he never fights with the ardor of the one in her first dream. Never with the intent to kill. Rey almost wishes he would be the unambiguously evil she envisioned.

 _That_ Kylo Ren she could safely hate.

**Author's Note:**

> I needed to sleep but I also needed to Reylo.
> 
>  
> 
> [Feel free to talk to me/send me requests on tumblr.](http://cobwebbing.tumblr.com/)


End file.
